3.4.1 The Classification and Distribution of Energy Resources Flashcards
• Classification of energy resources • Global distribution of fossil fuel stocks and reserves • Alternatives to conventional fossil fuel sources (45 cards)
What is a resource?
Something that the environment provides that is used to meet the needs of humans, can be basic or more complex
What is an energy resource?
Energy harnessed from the Earth and its processes
What is a renewable resource?
- A resource which can be used again
- Using it now will not impact on its availability in the future
- It is infinite
- Resources are generally regarded as sustainable and clean
What is a critical energy resource?
Resources which need to be managed to ensure future availability
What is a non-critical energy resource (flow)?
Everlasting energy resource which no amount of mismanagement can affect its availability
What is a non-renewable (stock) resource?
A source of energy that is a stock, and once used, there will be less left in the environment for future generations
What is a reserve?
A resource that exists in storage, normally beneath the surface of the Earth
What is a recoverable resource?
- The amount of a stock of a resource that is known about and can be recovered economically (at a profit) using existing technology
- As technology improves, previously impossible to reach stocks can be reached so these can increase over time
What is a speculative reserve?
Resources which are predicted to exist based on scientific research but have yet to be actually discovered (only speculated not a known quantity)
What are fossil fuels?
Plants and other organic life that died millions of years ago now lays buried under hundreds of meters of soil and sediment, which has fossilised over time
What are alternative energy sources?
Resources that are an alternative from dominant fuels, includes all renewables and nuclear
What is a primary energy resource?
Material which is extracted/harnessed which can then be converted into energy
E.g. coal, oil, wood, solar
What is a secondary energy resource?
Energy converted from from primary energy that can be stored or transported more easily
E.g. petrol, electricity
What is the continental/regional distribution of oil?
- Middle East 48.8%
- South and Central America 19.5%
- North America 14.3%
- Eurasia 8.0%
- Africa 7.2%
What are the countries which the greatest reserves?
- Venezuela 17.5%
- Saudi Arabia 17.2%
- Canada 9.7%
- Iran 9.0%
- Iraq 8.4%
What might happen to oil in the future?
- Advances in technology
- Decline in reserves in traditional places
- Unconventional sources may become the biggest reserves (e.g. N America shale rock, Canada tar sands)
What are physical factors that determine the distribution of oil?
- Geological formation from deltaic swamps in the carboniferous period
What is the continental/regional distribution of gas?
- Middle East 40.6%
- Eurasia 30.2%
- North America 9.7%
- Africa 7.5%
- Asia-Pacific 4.3%
What are the countries with the greatest gas reserves?
- Russia 24.3$
- Iran 17.1%
- Qatar 12.5%
- Turkmenistan 7.0%
- United States 6.7%
What might happen in the future to gas?
- Advances in technology
- Decline in reserves in traditional places
- Unconventional sources extracted from fracking
What are the physical factors that determine the distribution of energy?
- Geological formation from deltaic swamps in the carboniferous period
What is the continental/regional distribution of coal?
- Asia-Pacific 41.6%
- North America 24.8%
- Eurasia 15.1%
- Africa and Middle East 8.1%
- South and Central America 5.3%
What are the countries with the greatest coal reserves?
- USA 23.3%
- Russia 15.1%
- Australia 14.0%
- China 13.1%
- India 9.5%
What might happen to coal in the future?
- Global coal phase out policies
- Advances in technology (CCS)
